


Grief

by sparxwrites



Series: peace beneath the city [5]
Category: The Yogscast
Genre: Alternate Universe - Urban Fantasy, F/M, M/M, Urban Magic Yogs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-27
Updated: 2015-02-27
Packaged: 2018-03-15 12:23:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,684
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3447080
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sparxwrites/pseuds/sparxwrites
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Lomadia finally gets back from hiding the sword – just in her car, for now, she’ll have to find somewhere better for it in the morning – the house is quiet. Everyone seems to have settled down. Will’s still upstairs in bed, more likely than not asleep given the exhaustion that had made his eyes seem almost bruised. Lalna’s clearing the kitchen, if the clang of pots and click of plates is anything to go by, and she assumes Honeydew’s with him.</p><p>Which only leaves one person – and she finds him sat on a sofa in the middle of the living room, shoulders shaking as silent tears run down his face.</p><p>(In which Xephos struggles to deal with the knowledge of what, exactly his nephew has gotten himself into - and exactly how badly he's failed as a caretaker.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Grief

**Author's Note:**

> something i mentioned a while back as a follow-up to a bit of umy fic i wrote, that i've finally gotten round to putting into actual story format. part of the "peace beneath the city" series, and i'd highly recommend reading or re-reading "debt" (the story before this one in the series) before reading this for the complete experience, as it were, given this is something of an epilogue to it.

When Lomadia finally gets back from hiding the sword – just in her car, for now, she’ll have to find somewhere better for it in the morning – the house is quiet.

Everyone seems to have settled down. Will’s still upstairs in bed, more likely than not asleep given the exhaustion that had made his eyes seem almost bruised. Lalna’s clearing the kitchen, if the clang of pots and click of plates is anything to go by, and she assumes Honeydew’s with him.

Which only leaves one person – and she finds him sat on a sofa in the middle of the living room, shoulders shaking as silent tears run down his face.

“Oh, no,” she says, quietly, torn between sorrow and exasperation as she crosses the room in quick strides. Xephos’ hands are clasped in his lap, fingers twisted together tight enough to make his knuckles whiten, back bowed where he’s hunched over them like he’s been struck. He barely reacts to her presence as she settles down on the sofa next to him. “Xephos…”

An arm wrapped around his shoulder, she covers the hands clasped too-tight in his lap with her palm. He leans into her almost instantly with a quiet sob, hunched over and half-curled against her chest, and she rubs a thumb over the back of his hand in a quiet attempt at comfort. “Shh, shh. It’s okay.”

Pressing a kiss to his head, she tries to crane her neck to see through the door, check if Honeydew’s in the kitchen, and doesn’t quite manage it. “Dew!” she calls, hoping he hears – Xephos in this state is a little outside her zone of things she can confidently deal with. “Honeydew! Could you-”

The person that appears in the doorway is not Honeydew.

“Lalna,” she says, determinedly ignoring the way Xephos freezes against her, pulling a hand free from her grip to cover his face and try to hide his distress. “Could you go find Dew?” She sighs when he doesn’t respond, eyes just trained anxiously on Xephos’ curled, trembling form. “Lalna.”

“Is- is dad okay? What happened?” he asks, quietly, and it’s a mark of how nervous he is that the word _dad_ slips out. “What-”

Lomadia shakes her head, a quick, sharp motion, and clutches Xephos a little closer when she feels him suck in a shuddering breath. _I’ll explain later_ , she mouths above his head, says, “Just go get Dew for me, would you?” instead.

For a second, he hesitates, brows pulled into a frown and lips tight with nervousness. “‘Kay,” he agrees, quietly, curling a hand around the doorframe and hesitating. “Hope- hope you’re okay, dad.” Then he’s gone, darting down the hallway with surprising speed and no small amount of urgency.

The minute Lalna’s gone, Xephos sobs against her shoulder again, a wet hiccup of sound “God,” he says, quietly, voice thick and wet and shaking. “I’m a mess, a _mess_ , what are the kids going to- to think-” He cuts off with a shuddering gasp, and Lomadia makes another quiet, shushing noise. Lalna’s hardly a child, she wants to point out, but doesn’t. Instead, she swallows the words and rubs his shoulder in an slightly hopeless attempt to keep him from getting worked up.

“It’s okay. Just breathe,” she says, listens to the way the air hitches and chokes in his chest and throat and quietly prays he doesn’t start crying in earnest – because she knows, if he does, he won’t stop.

Honeydew arrives in the doorway a moment later, heralded by the sound of bare feet slapping against the wood flooring and with Lalna at his shoulder. “What-” he starts, alarm thick in his voice, and then quiets when he sees Xephos tucked close against Lomadia.

“Lalna,” he says, instead, voice quiet and measured and eyes still on Xephos. “Why don’t you go upstairs and check on your cousin? He’s had a hell of a day. Could probably do with someone to give him a hug. Or hold his hand. Something.”

He doesn’t wait to see Lalna nod at the clear dismissal, doesn’t wait to see him hurry towards the stairs and take them two at a time with a quiet huff of effort. Instead, he pads slowly across the room, settles down on the sofa next to Xephos on the opposite side to Lomadia. “Xephos?” he asks, softly, concern written in every syllable and the thin lines at the corners of his eyes. “Hey. Hey, shh, c’mere.”

The moment Honeydew touches Xephos’ shoulder, the floodgates break.

Pulling away from Lomadia and turning to press his face into his husband’s shoulder, Xephos starts sobbing in earnest. He fumbles to the side, catches Lomadia’s fingers and links them with his as the cries tear through him, harsh enough to make his shoulders shake. The ache in his chest feels like it’s choking him, strangling him, and the noises that rip their way from deep between his ribs are loud and ugly and uncontrolled.

“Oh, Xeph…” says Honeydew, quietly, lips twisted in quiet distress at Xephos’ pain, at the fact there’s nothing he can do to help it. “Alright. Alright. Steady now.”

“I- I just do- don’t-” Xephos chokes on his tears, squeezes Lomadia’s hand hard enough to hurt and presses his face against Honeydew’s shoulder again as he struggles to catch his breath. “Don’t un-understand where I we- went w-w-wrong, I- I t-taught him all- he sh-should- I tau- taught him-”

“And a bloody good job you’ve done of teaching him too,” says Honeydew, firmly, tucking Xephos’ head under his chin and running gentle fingers through close-cropped hair. “Kid couldn’t have asked for a better uncle, or a better mentor.” He feels Xephos tense, feels him draw in breath to argue, and preempts it. “No, no. Don’t argue with me. Shh.”

“Oh, don’t you go blaming yourself for this,” snaps Lomadia, annoyance breaking through her sympathy for a second . “He’s a grown man. He knows the dangers, and he’s gone and gotten himself involved with the fae anyways. That’s his problem, not yours.”

The words, unsurprisingly, do little to console Xephos, and Honeydew scowls mildly at her as he mouths _not helpful._ Xephos collapses back against Honeydew’s chest, gasping ugly sobs and wheezes for a long minute until he manages to wrestle back some kind of control, forced to quiet if only to catch his breath.

Lomadia sighs, rubbing a thumb over the knuckles of Xephos’ hand in quiet apology. “Look. I know you and Kirin don’t have the _best_ history,” she says, slowly. “And goddess knows I’ve got _no_ fondness for the old goat at all. But… Will could’ve done a _lot_ worse, Xeph. At least it’s not – heavens forbid – the Garbage Court he’s gone and tied himself to. Like it or not, Kirin’s… the best of a bad lot.”

Shuddering at the mere thought of the Garbage Court having any kind of claim over his nephew, Xephos draws in a deep, shaking breath, and sits up from Honeydew a little.

“I- I suppose you’re right,” he says, hesitantly, lifting a hand to rub at the tear tracks on his face, mouth thinning into a distressed line at the puffy feel of his eyes and the way his nose is running. “L-look at me, making a fuss- I’m a mess-”

He sucks in another shaky gasp, trying to calm himself, and only succeeds in reminding himself of the tight knot of pain curled deep in his chest. Pressing a palm to his breastbone, he closes his eyes, swallows hard against the sobs rising in his throat again and can’t quite stop the tears from trickling out through his eyelashes.

“Just-” he says, and breaks again as another wave of grief washes over him. He curls in on himself like he’s trying to protect a physical wound, choking on the deep, aching sobs that are ripped from somewhere down around his stomach. “I- I- just-”

Honeydew closes his own eyes, squeezes them shut and clutches Xephos tighter against his chest again, petting through his hair. “Shh, shh,” he murmurs, softly, whispers quiet endearments and comforts in Dwarvish into his husband’s ear. “There we go. Shhh.”

“I just- can’t believe- didn’t notice-” manages Xephos, the words strangled out of him, fractured scraps of sound that cost incredible effort to make. “He was- all this time- hurting- and suffering- and I didn’t-” The words get lost in another wave of gasps that hitch in his chest, and don’t come back, no breath or space for them through the tears.

There’s little they can do other than sit there, Honeydew with Xephos tucked curled against his chest and Lomadia with warm, gentle hands stroking up and down his back, until the tears run dry. They hold him through it until the sobs slow and quiet and he finally, finally manages to catch his breath and calm.

None of them count how long it takes, or look at the clock, but by the time Xephos is finally sat upright and quiet – tears wiped from his cheeks but eyes still shiny and puffy and red-rimmed – night has well and truly fallen.

“I just…” says Xephos, after a long moment, one hand curled around Lomadia’s and the other around Honeydew’s. “I just don’t know what to do.” There’s no anger or sorrow in his voice any more, just flat exhaustion and a hollow sort of hopelessness. “I don’t know what I _can_ do, if- if there even _is_ anything I can do…”

Out in the hallway, two floors up, Will hangs heavy against Lalna’s side, the arm around his back and his own arm over Lalna’s shoulders the only reason he’s still standing. His legs shake with the effort, the strain too much after his earlier seizures, but he refuses to move or sit down despite his cousin’s concerned glances.

Instead, he stays there, clutching at the banister and Lalna for support as they listen in silence. Xephos’ sobs, quiet though they are, carry easily through the old house, and Will grits his teeth against the knife that every gasp drives into his stomach.


End file.
